Insight

April 23, 2008 - April 25, 2008

#1: Alarm Clock

It's raining a lot more in New York, and you find yourself staying inside. On Tuesday before court, the radio alarm wakes you up with a loud burst of static, before bits of late night religious programing drift in and out of audibility. You're half-asleep and mostly undreaming (you think) as it happens.

"But a Samaritan, as he traveled... and when he saw him, he took pity on him...."

Tzzzzzzz....

"We are called... ...children... God is watching..."

Brrrrizzzzzzttttt fffflllffflp

"...tree that ...thrown into the fire"

Weeeeeee....zzzzzz..... click

"He was oppressed, and he was afflicted,
yet he opened not his mouth;
like a lamb that is led to the slaughter."

You're pretty certain that you set the alarm for buzzer... fuck.

#2: A Letter From a Friend

Souris receives the following email.

My Dear de Song

Greetings, I know this mail may come with you as a gently surprise,I am Abel Cain BloodySunday the solicitor/counsel to the late -xXx- who was then before his death, the President/Head of State of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Just yesterday his widow wife Mrs. Love Darkwater-Gladius called to intimate me of the condition of her family over the pursuance of fund by the Government over the husbands alleged loot.

In fact, She conferred in me that her son was working with an Austian National only for the German to take advantage of the situation, there by setting her son up in Veradero where he went to claim You can verify this fact your self through the Halifax Embassy over an alleged -xXx-'s Son, Mr. V. Av ery Pearlharbour trying to pull out the sum of (US$666 M) Six hundred Million Dollars from the Bank.

At this point in time, She solicited my humble self to look for a reputable person who will be of great assistance to the family and somebody who can take over the sum of C$27M (Twenty Seven Million United States Candaian Dollars Only)which is presently deposited in a Security Company, namely GOOD SAMARITAN LLC, for investment. I will later on the course of this transaction disclosed to you the Security Company accordingly.

If you will be interested to act upon on receipt of this mail, please do contact me on the enlisted contact adress and more so be kind to issue me with your current Telephone Number for prompt conversation.

into the fire, into the clouds, and as soon as the inner voices begin to speak surrender to them, don't ask first whether it's Wagner objected to "Parsifal" being given except at Bayreuth. When impresario Neumann, in 1882, "She honestly wouldn't have wanted this. I'd know better than yoher eyes are cloudy and unmoving as one, two, threefour five bullets hit home. Her expression never changes as the gunfire whips her neck dogwood tree is small yet special. It has life the whole year long. Even in winter, it seems to keep singing

#3: To Mar Their Hunting Sport

#4: A Tarot Reading

Perhaps in light of recent events, perhaps to clear your mind because it's just what you do, you decide to read some tarot. You roll out your scarf and light a single unscented candle before you start the spread. You hope that you can make this a little meditative.

Card I: Hanged man.

Interesting.

Card II: Ten of Swords.

Um... huh. You've seen that one before.

Card III: ...

You don't really get to Card III. Inexplicably and without warning, Vav charges from his hidey hole under the refrigerator toward the table. You hear a small mammalian shriek as you realize there's a mouse underfoot. He barrels into the table, and the cards, scarf, and candle fall haphazardly. You are fast distracted by having to put out a very small fire.

When you're done stamping it out, you look to see that the Hanged Man card has been rather badly fire-damaged - the figure and the tree he hangs from in the image are charred black.

Well fuck.

The next card was going to have been inverted Justice, if you're curious.

#5: Star Gazing

When you were a child, did you ever look at the night sky and mistake the lights of aircrafts for stars? Did you ever excitedly point out that the stars were moving to your parents, only to be corrected and told that the universe was a notch more mundane than anticipated?

Naturally only you can say if you did this as a child or not, being the only person intimately familiar with your own childhood, but for some reason you think on this phenomenon as you stare up above you, watching blinking lights fall from Orion's hands and vanishing into Pisces.

Wait a minute.

Since when can anyone see the night sky in New York!?

#6: Finally... a dream sequence

On Wednesday you have dreams - vivid, symbolic dreams that don't seem to fuck around and that you remember near perfectly when you wake.

You're standing in court, and you find that the great table is lined with silver bowls and cups and various pieces of eating utensils - all filled with ashes. Collapsed in every seat are the Kindred of New York, their faces concealed by black veils. They lie motionless. Prince Wright stands at the head of the table, having just announced Elisa's ascension to the Seneschalship. Her face is pale as monumental alabaster as she walks to his side.

You look up at the ceiling of the meeting hall to find that it's fretted with gold and partially open to the sky above, showing a firmament that is half night and half daylight - a sun and a full moon on either side of the divide.

You can see that there's a portrait hanging behind Brody - a dark haired woman with no mouth. Elisa and Wright take their seats at last and the entire court seemingly awakens, sits upright, and turns their heads to something behind you.

Standing amidst the red couches are Auberon, Petrov, and an unseeable third figure whose shape and form blur in and out of focus as you try to look at him. The other two men have their hands slick with blood.

Before your eyes the figure collapses onto the floor and falls into a swarm of writhing black snakes.

#7: A Non-Insightful Aside

You are painfully aware that the amount of intuition you're getting regarding the world is bizarre. You can't figure what it all MEANS, necessarily, but you know that this can't be normal.

You consider telling Regent Jones briefly, but doubt it to be anything but suicidally stupid to do so.

Something inside your brain tells you He'll know eventually though if it keeps up like this. You can already hear him, in your mind, making the call to set up a transfer.

Fuckit.

#8: Help From Wikipedia

You click through the internet a bit in a daze, trying to make sense out of the massive onslaught of symbolism that seems to be buffeting your brain. Admittedly the Internet isn't the best place to go to clear your thoughts but you're at a loss.

Interesting... Vav is the kabbalistic sigil that is thought to be the Mark of Cain. Serpents, while overtly phallic, can represent the monstrous feminine. BloodySunday was the name of a character in the hit GameCube game killer7 by Suda Goichi. Purcell's Dido and Aeneas was thought by some to represent the seduction of James the II away from England by Catholic occultists.

Oh yes, Opposums...

"When threatened or harmed, they will play possum, mimicking the appearance and smell of a sick or dead animal. The physiological response is involuntary, rather than a conscious act. Their stiff, curled form can be prodded, turned over, and even carried away."

...

The buzzer in your brain that signifies mystic import blares on and off like a piece of psychic clockwork.

#9 Some Roadkill

You find that one of NYU campus' many fat overfed squirrels had gotten on the wrong end of some sort of motor vehicle, and now lies splattered on the pavement - maggots spilling out of it's left eye. You shunt it off into the grass with a long stick.

It's blood has spilt in the shape of what you THINK is the Madonna and child... you twitch a bit as you realize that by tilting your head the image shifts for you, as what looks like baby Jesus held up starts to look like a pillow held down...

A mother holding down a pillow... what the...

You shunt the animal behind the bushes and kick a black clove cigarette butt (goddamn hipster kids) as you walk away. You realize that more than anything it now looks like a bunch of stupid utterly non-symbolic dried blood.

#10 Regarding the absence of INSIGHT INSTALLMENT 6

Somewhere you run into a man (your think he's a Baptist), notices how pale you look and hands you a pamphlet about accepting Christ into your heart and overcoming drug problems at the same time.

The cover reads "My God my God, why have you forsaken me?"

You toss it into a nearby trash bin after browsing it, and find that the wind blows it out soon after. You briefly chase it down, not wanting to litter, and stop it against a brick wall. Emblazoned on it is a strangely creepy piece of street art - a child carrying a red balloon and holding a flower as they look over a gravestone.

The stenciled spray-enameled text reads: "There is no greater love than to lay down your life for a friend"

You realize on some meta-level that this had nothing to do with the absent INSIGHT INSTALLMENT 6... and that INSIGHT INSTALLMENT 6 wasn't even missing to begin with.

#11 Just in case you thought you were crazy

You stop at a 7-11 for some unknown and ungodly reason, and find it suspicious that they're out of plastic knives.

#12 Half dreaming

On Friday, you aren't certain whether or not you fall asleep. You lie down and find yourself immobile, but your mind seems to race for the entire day with conscious thought. You brain churns through a web of connections between one Cainite and another, and you work intellectually in dream-logic through the mess, half guided by voices that you're not quite certain to be your own consciousness.

You know there's a Samaritan. You know there's a lamb. You know there's a tree. You know that the pope's visiting...

You know that somebody is going to die and soon. You guess Elisa or Petrov. Probably both. Petrov if it's either of them.

You know that somehow big things are portended by little things... and you know somebody is watching, somewhere out of the corners of your vision, watching you puzzle it out.

You aren't certain how you feel about being watched. You know that it's not really something you can help.

#13: Kurt Cobain

Vav isn't moving when you awaken. He seems to have died in his sleep.

You got up before the alarm. As you discover the body, the radio clicks on and the pretentious indie college radio station plays you the following song about Kurt Cobain.

You feel stretched very thin - as if you'll float away without much effort. You're oddly and utterly unsurprised to read the morning paper and hear that the dogwood tree allegedly crumbled into ash when Pope Benedict stopped by to view it.